LAWRENCE — Back in October of last year, Big 12 Conference commissioner Brett Yormark spoke to the possibility of a 20-game league schedule for its men’s basketball programs.

Yormark, still not all that long into his new job, cited recent expansion as one reason. He highlighted scheduling and travel as others. As he addressed members of the media in Kansas City in Oct. 2023, he noted that’s where he thought the head coaches in the conference landed.

Fast forward to last Thursday in Lawrence, and Kansas basketball coach Bill Self didn’t come across in favor of it. As he reacted to the delay of the Big 12 Mexico initiative, which he alluded to something that’ll help ease the burden of an already challenging schedule for the 2024-25 season, the next question that came his way centered on the possibility of a 20-game schedule in conference play.

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“We don’t want that,” Self said at his team’s end-of-season banquet. “We don’t want that. You go to 20 league games, and then you’re already playing an exempt tournament, and you’ve got the Champions (Classic), and you’ve got ... if the Big East challenge continues, and you play four home-and-homes, your schedule’s basically done and you don’t even talk about a buy game or anything.”

Had there been a 20-game Big 12 schedule this past season, Kansas would have only had a handful of games to work with as it formed its 31-game regular season schedule — it played two major non-conference series. It’s tough to say how much the Jayhawks’ final record of 23-11 would have changed, or how much better or worse it’s 10-8 mark in league play would have looked. But the number of opportunities for development at home, early in the season, would have been affected.

Kansas, which saw its season end in the round of the 32 of the NCAA tournament, had six scholarship newcomers one the roster for the 2023-24 season opener. There were a trio of freshman guards in Johnny Furphy, Elmarko Jackson and Jamari McDowell. There were a trio of incoming transfers in center Hunter Dickinson, forward Parker Braun and guard Nicolas Timberlake.

Game experience, especially when acclimating to a new system with new teammates, is vital. It sets up a team with a chance to compete at its best when conference play begins. Two games might not sound like a lot over the course of a season. But, in the context of the remaining non-conference games, Self is referring to the percentage of those games rises considerably.

“One of our problems this year with our young kids was we didn’t play a schedule that allowed those guys to play through mistakes,” said Self, whose team’s postseason run was significantly affected due to injury. “… Going to 20 league games, that would be that on steroids.”

Jordan Guskey covers University of Kansas Athletics at The Topeka Capital-Journal. He is the National Sports Media Association’s sportswriter of the year for the state of Kansas for 2022. Contact him at jmguskey@gannett.com or on Twitter at @JordanGuskey.

This article originally appeared on Topeka Capital-Journal: Kansas basketball coach Bill Self doesn't want a 20-game Big 12 slate